Against the wishes of Stacy Peterson’s loved ones, Will County board members narrowly defeated a measure to include a referendum on the November ballot that would have asked voters if the county should replace elected coroners with appointed medical examiners.

Senate President Emil Jones Jr.’s office issued a news release Monday afternoon announcing his decision to retire when his current Senate term ends in mid-January. He didn’t say why he is stepping down.

The jockeying among would-be successors to Senate President Emil Jones Jr. already was well under way Monday by the time Jones confirmed what others had said and officially announced his plans to retire.

To Dr. Gerald Lofthouse, rock climbing is a physical puzzle. “You’re playing with these finite elements. The rock is what it is, and your body is what it is, and you try to put the two together to solve the problem of how to get from here to there,” said Lofthouse, a family medicine doctor. “It’s an intellectually intriguing game.”

As the leader of a third-generation family-owned business, John Griffin of Kelley Williamson Co. wasn’t around when his grandfather chose to make the forerunners of AMCORE Bank the company’s primary bank.

Tim Wallace bought a historic inn in rural Oakford just as it was about to be torn down, and has spent countless hours making it habitable again.

The music starts to pound and 30 barbells rise into the air. Another Body Pump class is under way at Peak Sports Club and instructor Leslie Schaeffer starts the warmup phase of a workout that fills to capacity for 12 to 15 sessions a week.

The state and the union that represents about 35,000 of its employees have reached a tentative agreement on a new contract.

At chef school, kids learn the dying art of preparing a meal.

Trent Tomlinson opens for Trace Adkins Sunday night at the Illinois State Fair Grandstand.

Doing the laundry, vacuuming the house and mowing the lawn may not be popular activities — unless the alternative is not being around to do them. Helping people who have survived a heart attack or some other heart-related event return to the routine as well as the fun things in their lives is what cardiac rehabilitation is all about, according to Jan Forman, a nurse in OSF Saint Anthony’s Cardiopulmonary Center.

Nancy Parkinson bought a car that could run on either gasoline or ethanol-based E85 fuel in 2002. It wasn’t to save money — in 2002, gas prices were hovering at around $1.40 or so. She just got a good deal on the car.

When 132 freshmen move into their new residence hall at the University of Illinois at Springfield next week, they’ll find new beds, new desks, construction workers and a whole lot of vegetation just outside their windows.

Layoffs, furlough days and a wage freeze are being imposed in state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias’ office because of budget cuts made by Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Bickering and disarray within the state’s Democratic Party are creating an opportunity for Illinois Republicans to regain their once-mighty political strength, and they hope to start that process in November, GOP stalwarts said Thursday.